Safety C.J. Spillman will be coming after Bruce Ellington, or LaMichael James, or whoever else is returning punts and kickoffs in the 49ers’ season opener Sunday against the host Cowboys.

Two days after getting cut by the 49ers, Spillman signed Monday and promptly practiced with their season-opening opponent, the Cowboys.

“Spillman’s been a very good special teams player for San Francisco, and before that San Diego,” Cowboys coach Jason Garrett told reporters Monday. “We also feel he’ll be a good position player for us if we need him to go play.”

Garrett called it a coincidence that the Cowboys acquired a player who came from their Week 1 opponent.

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“We’ve all been in those situations you have a coach or player from another team, and you have conversations with those guys about different things,” Garrett said. “But for the most part, most teams do best when they trust their preparations off of film and base a lot of their game plan off film and the traditional way to evaluate.

“Sometimes those things can be helpful. Sometimes they can kind of confuse the issue. We brought him in because we thought he was a good football player who can help our team.

Spillman spent most of the past four seasons with the 49ers as a special-teams ace, arriving in October 2010 off waivers by the San Diego Chargers. One of his most memorable plays was his recovery off a muffed punt in a January 2013 playoff win over the Green Bay Packers.

Spillman’s former special-teams role on the 49ers could fall to several players, including Jimmie Ward, Dontae Johnson, James McCray and Chris Cook.

Spillman had no interceptions or sacks in his 49ers tenure, and most of his defensive action came on the goal-line package.

To make room Spillman, the Cowboys released Ahmad Dixon, an undrafted rookie safety out of Baylor.